Thoughts on Rooftops
by Dizzy Dresden
Summary: Sequel to Barstools. Yuffie’s thoughts catch up with her and demand to be answered and won’t stop bothering her until she does. Someone else demands to be answered, too.


So, Yuffie flew the hell outta there as fast as she could, scaling fire escapes and walls, running down roads and streets and alleyways, when her mind finally caught up to her and asked what the hell she was running from. Well, her mind didn't so much as ask her, it was more like it screamed the question and slammed a brick in her face.

She stopped abruptly with a less than smooth jerk, causing a group of pedestrians to stare at here wide-eyed and open-mouthed.

Just _what_ exactly was she running from?

Yuffie resisted the urge to slap herself upside the face, before she caused that group to think she was more insane than she actually was. Gawd, insane was right. Here she was, in Leviathan knows where part of the city, running from…

Okay, she didn't want to think about that right now, so where exactly was she? Glancing around, she noticed that the people weren't staring at her anymore (thank Leviathan) and she was right by the Edge Public Library. Cool, Cool, she could go three floors up and sit on the roof for a bit while she thought about… _that_.

She calmly ambled up the stairs in what she hoped was a nonchalant and composed manner (it wasn't), threw open the library doors, and got glared at by the wrinkled and crotchety old librarian who probably still remembered her from Yuffie's incident with the self-checkout. The glare was reminiscent of… no, no, no, not thinking about that, not now, let's wait until the rooftop.

Yuffie shook her head and shakily ran her hand through her hair as she slowly walked up the stairs. At the third floor, she took care of the lock on the door to the outside in a matter of seconds and stepped outside, taking a deep breath of the outside air.

The view was decent, to say the least. Reeve took pride in building Edge and anyone could see that by simply looking at the city itself. A city made from leftover scrap metal and worn memories, now bustling and growing bigger by the day. Yuffie smiled for a second, thinking of all the work that was put into it, and her friends being right there with her, along with the refugees of Midgar, building it one building at a time.

She shook her head and walked towards the edge of the library and sat down on the ledge. Kicking her heels against the wall, she tilted her head back and watched the inevitable summer thunderstorm start to roll in.

So, why exactly did she run away from Vincent? She went down a mental checklist.

Still Hot? Check.

Still Brooding? Check.

Still Socially Awkward? Check.

Still Housing Multiple Demons? Check… oh, wait.

A light bulb turned on in her head.

That's it! He doesn't have Chaos anymore, because when he went to go fight Omega, Chaos went all explody and stuff. She did slap herself upside the head this time.

Great, so now that he lost a part of his scary demon dangerous part, he wasn't as awesome anymore? Now, instead of being Angsty-But-Hot, he's gone to Creeper-with-demons-but-is-still-hot. That makes a lot of sense. Not.

Yuffie kicked her heels against the edge harder. Stupid, stupid, stupid. The only reason that she liked him was the sense of danger she got from Chaos? That's kinky. She absolutely hated herself for a moment. Vincent was still hot, still broody, still all the things that made him who he is minus the worst part that made him angst the most. That means he probably a helluva lot more approachable. Goddamn, she was stupid. That didn't mean anything, she still sure as hell liked him in the same way as before.

She guessed the main reason she ran away was that she didn't like change. Change was bad, always bad. But, in this case, it could be good. Maybe.

That doesn't explain the whole eye thing though! Well, maybe because Shelke was holding onto him like that, or he was tired, or… She didn't really have anyway to explain it, but now that she had thought about it, she was glad he was back and safe.

But that stupid Shelke was in the way now and had the carbon copy of Lucretia's memories embedded in her computer brain and goddamn she should have been on that ship instead of Shelke. Shelke didn't really care about Vincent like she did, it was only those dumb memories making Shelke feel that way.

Okay, now she was just making excuses.

As she was mentally beating her inner-self to a bloody pulp, she heard the door squeak open.

Shit, now she had to deal with the staff kicking her out of the library the third time. Secretly, she hoped it was the nice security guard that always gave her peppermints.

"I know, I know, authorized staff only up here," she said, without even bothering to turn around and waving a careless hand. "Just give me a few more minutes, going through a mental thingy right now, so if you don't mind…"

There was only an answering silence, which meant Peppermint-Guard wasn't the one looming behind her. She really, really hoped it wasn't the mean librarian lady, because that would mean she would be kicked out for good and she would have to find a new roof to think on and Seventh Heaven's just wasn't cutting it anymore.

Yuffie looked around slowly and what she saw almost made her fall off the roof and turn into nasty Yuffie goosh.

It was Vincent. Vincent Goddamn Fucking Valentine, number one on the list of people she sure as hell did not want to see, right next to Don Corneo and any form of Sephiroth.

He stood there, just stood there, with a slightly confused look on his face.

And Yuffie stood up slowly, mentally going over exit strategies, while cautiously looking into his eyes.

They were normal.

Wait, what?!

"Yuffie, what's wrong?" he said, one hand still loosely grasping the door.

She stared at him and it looked like he was wearing a pair of Cloud's pants and he had a black collared shirt on, and there was no claw, no gun, no cape, but he still managed to give off the sense of swishing.

Crap, he looked downright normal. And hot, her brain reminded her, but then it also reminded her of Shelke and her arm-huggy-ness, so she got really pissed when he asked again, only this time managing to sound concerned.

"What's wrong?" she screamed, although she didn't quite know why. "What's wrong? You come back after three weeks of nothing and you have to the balls to ask me what's wrong?"

He only looked more confused after that.

"Yuffie," he started to say, but was cut off when she stalked up to him and grabbed him by the collar.

"We thought you were dead. _Dead. _For three weeks, we all freaking searched and searched and searched for you, and you don't even have the common courtesy to give anyone of us a simple call saying 'Oh, hi, I'm alive and stuff. Don't worry.' or Leviathan forbid, a text message!" She growled and fisted his collar tighter before letting go.

He sighed and turned his head away from her. "I was… busy."

"Busy doing what, Vincent? Sulking, brooding, moaning over what ever, too busy to even give us a heads up?" She glared at him accusingly now.

"It was a mistake," is the only thing he said in reply to that, and Yuffie was fed up with the whole thing.

"Yeah, whatever Vincent, just… go away. I'm _busy_ this time," she growled and sat back down on the ledge.

"So, this would be the place with the… thing?"

Her neck almost snapped when she turned back to look at him.

"Did you, Vincent Valentine, just make a joke?" she said, completely baffled. "Okay, now I know you were replaced with a clone."

He didn't say anything in reply, but instead he walked closer to her.

Yuffie's brain went into overdrive. Here was Vinnie, joking around and now coming even closer by the minute and he's actually smiling, and holy guacamole, is he flirting with me? Did the whole Omega thing change him that much? But what about Shelke? What about Lucretia? So, now he grows feeling and all that sentimental bullshit as soon as he has a replacement Lucretia. Of course.

"What's wrong?" he asked again.

"Vinnie," she sighed. "You'd never understand it."

She got up and started to walk towards the doorway, but Vincent blocked it. She glared at him.

"Move."

He shook his head.

"_Move_."

"Not until you tell me why you stayed up for three weeks waiting for me and then flee at the sight of me."

Oh, so Cid or Tifa told him all about that, did they? Guilt tripped him into this, too, probably.

What's the worst that could happen, a part of her brain in the very back that usually only said things when she was doing something bad.

Screw it.

Yuffie grabbed him by the collar, dragged him down so their lips smashed together. They stayed that way for what could have been hours or seconds, until Yuffie pulled away sharply.

"That's what's wrong." she said and moved a flabbergasted Vincent out of her way and went back to Seventh Heaven to go beat up Tifa and Cid.

**XXX**

**Yes, there's going to be another story after this. Chill. And I won't take as long in updating, either.**

**Review!**

**-Dizzy  
**


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